


how to use your superpowers responsibly

by ArgentLives



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: F/F, Identity Reveal, Implied/Referenced Sex, Secret Identity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-03
Updated: 2016-03-03
Packaged: 2018-05-24 12:02:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6153058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArgentLives/pseuds/ArgentLives
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Linda Park did, in fact, make out with the Flash—only in this world, the Flash is not Barry Allen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	how to use your superpowers responsibly

**Author's Note:**

> the whole point of this was supposed to be written for the femslash kink meme to fill someone's request of parkwest with flash!iris and vibrating fingers but then I remembered I can't write smut so there's no actual smut in this and it doesn't really fill the request; I spent too much time on it not to finish it anyway though so w/e

 

[From: Iris West 7:36 p.m.] _Larkin kept a little later than expected. tied up at work rn. pls wait up. I have to tell you something important._

Linda scowled at her phone, a bitter feeling churning in her gut as she easily recognized the lie. Seriously, her girlfriend’s excuses were getting thinner and thinner—it was like she wasn’t even trying anymore. The thought was unsettling; it could mean any number of things, like maybe Iris’s conscience was finally kicking in and she was planning on coming clean, or maybe she was planning on ditching Linda altogether. Either way, Linda’s stomach twisted into knots just thinking about it, knowing that she couldn’t let it go on any longer. She had to end it on her own terms, beat Iris to the punch, especially if the nagging suspicions that were getting increasingly more difficult to ignore might be true. It just…it didn’t make _sense_.

 _‘Bullshit.’_ she sent back, not interested in playing dumb. ‘ _Larkin left when I did, you were the one who insisted on staying later to finish your article. There’s no way he could’ve asked you to stay later.’_

There was a disquieting pause before her phone buzzed again with an answer, which Linda knew was significant in itself. Iris almost always texted back ridiculously quick, sometimes to the point where Linda wondered how it was even possible for her fingers to move that fast. If she wasn’t responding right away, well…she had a lot of explaining to do.

[IW: 7:38] _‘Busy.’_ The first text read, and then a solid two seconds later, _‘Explain later.’_ The pause was long enough that Linda could practically see Iris’s fingers hovering over the keyboard with uncertainty, could easily picture the crease appear between her eyebrows like it always did when she was thinking particularly hard about something. Most of the time Linda found it endearing, often getting caught up in staring at Iris’s hyper-focused expression as she pored over her notes or worked on a particularly tricky article, but just the thought of it now was making her angry. She sighed in resignation as her phoned buzzed three more times in rapid succession, and she debated whether to ignore it or not before caving and checking it anyway.

[IW 7:40] _Prom night I’ll explain for real this time_

[IW 7:40] _*i meant prom mice_

[IW 7:41] _***PROMISE!!!_

[IW 7:41] _Fucking autocorrect_

Linda rolled her eyes and tossed her phone aside, settling back in to work on research for an article Larkin had asked her to write, only half-paying attention to the words on the screen in front of her. In the end, she wound up dozing off, letting herself sink further into the couch cushions, checking her phone every now and again and silently cataloguing the time passing by.

 She was trying and failing not to wallow in the possibility that Iris had stood her up, which was seemingly increasingly likely as the hours ticked by, when the door to her apartment flew open. A sudden and impossible gust of wind swept the papers off of the coffee table in front of her, blowing her hair all over the place. She didn’t even have time to be afraid, because before she could even turn around something—some _one_ —was speaking.

“ _Linda Park_ ,” The Flash warbled, vibrating their voice so that it echoed eerily throughout the apartment. “ _We need to talk_.”

Linda jumped at the sound, her laptop nearly tumbling out of her lap as she whipped around to face the dark corner the voice had come from. The dark corner that someone was now most definitely standing in, and hadn’t been just moments before. And not just any someone—

“Holy shit,” Linda’s eyes went wide, pulse racing, heart taking up a steady residence in her throat, “You—you’re _him_.”

“Jesus _Christ_ Linda,” the figure groaned, stepping out of the shadows with a scowl, and Linda felt her heart somehow beat even faster at that voice, tugging insistently at something in her memory, because it was so _familiar_ , but no, it couldn’t be— “How many times have I told you that the Flash might be a woman!”

“Iris?” Linda blinked, her mouth falling open in shock, because as soon as she stepped into the light, there was no mistaking it. She slammed her laptop closed and tossed it to the side as she scrambled off the couch, breathing hard as she approached the woman before her. Clad in the red, skin-tight crime-fighting suit she’d only ever seen before from a distance. _Holy shit._ “ _You’re_ the Flash?”

“Yeah,” she huffed, looking thoroughly put-out as she pushed her cowl back, “And thanks to you this reveal wasn’t nearly as dramatic or intense as I pictured it being.”

Linda just shook her head in response, opening and closing her mouth like she couldn’t quite form the words. She approached Iris on shaky legs, her chest heaving in—shock? Amazement? Disappointment? Iris couldn’t tell, but she sincerely hoped it wasn’t the latter, and forced herself to stay rooted to the spot as Linda stopped right in front of her. “Oh my God—you—I—you’re,” a deep breath, a pause, and then, “ _I made out with the Flash_.” Iris opened her mouth to respond, but Linda didn’t stop there. “Like, so many times! I’m _dating_ the Flash. Shit, Iris, _why didn’t you just tell me_?”

And there it was, the hurt that Iris had knew would be there but that stung all the same. “I’m sorry, Linda, really I am—I wanted to tell you, and I was going to, but then I started getting all mixed up in fighting these crazy dangerous people and—I didn’t want to put you in danger. I couldn’t stand the thought of you getting hurt because of me, but—that was stupid of me, because I just ended up hurting you by not telling you, and you deserve to know, and I don’t want you to think I don’t trust you because I _do_ and—I’m sorry.”

“Iris, it’s okay. I get it. I don’t like it, but I get it.” Linda gave her a shaky smile that told her that she was probably hurting more than she was letting on, that maybe it wasn’t really okay after all, not yet at least, but it could be. “Hey—was this the reason for the sudden hairstyle change?”

“I thought you said you liked it,” Iris pouted, taking the sudden subject change in stride, self-consciously running her fingers through the short mess of curls. She liked the natural look, anyway, and Linda had told her it looked nice when she’d first gone with it, but suddenly she couldn’t help but feel self-conscious under her girlfriend’s curious gaze. What if she’d been lying just to make her feel better? What if she secretly hated it? What if—

“I do!” Linda assured her, and Iris let out a breath of relief. “I think it looks great—although to be fair, I’m pretty sure you could rock anything. It just makes a whole lot more sense now, why you cut it so short all of a sudden. I’m sure it makes it easier with the suit, and all. Which is such a weird thought, oh my God, _you_ running around in _that_ —but seriously, _everything_ makes so much more sense now. And to think I thought you—well, I guess it doesn’t matter now.”

“Thought I what?” Iris prompted, a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach as she mulled over the possibilities, realized all of the terrible conclusions Linda must have come to, left to her own devices. She wanted to kick herself for letting this go on so long without someone she trusted so wholly, for allowing that seed of doubt to be planted in the first place.

“It’s just…you were always sneaking out of the apartment late at night, and making excuses for why you had to cancel plans—which were always awful, by the way, you’re a terrible liar and you really need to work on that if you don’t want to broadcast your secret identity to the rest of the world—and you were always making all those secretive calls, and I just started to worry, you know?”

“You thought I was cheating on you?” Iris’s eyes widened, a horrified expression taking over her features. “Fuck, Linda, that’s not—I’d _never_ —God, I’m sorry.”

“You’re, uh, you’re not right? Just to be clear? Like, I can chalk all that up to Flash business?”

Iris shook her head fervently, stepping forward to tuck a stray lock of hair behind Linda’s ear. “Linda, that’s not the kind of person I am. I would never, I promise. I’m all yours. The calls were all to S.T.A.R. Labs, I’ve been sort of working with them and they’ve been helping me; I’ll have to take you to meet Cisco and Caitlin soon, now that I can, they’re both really cool people and I think you’d like them. Cisco won’t stop teasing me about how much I talk about you, anyway, he’s probably dying to meet you in person.”

“Wait. Cisco—I’ve heard that name before. That’s Barry’s boyfriend, isn’t it? The top secret one that I was starting to think didn’t exist because you both kept making excuses as to why I couldn’t meet him?”

“Oh, yeah. They bonded a lot while I was in my coma. You know, because Cisco worked at S.T.A.R., and Barry came to visit me a lot, only I was—well, in a coma. And they really hit it off. Romantic, right?” she shot Linda a rueful little smile, but in all honesty she was happy for her friends, even if they got together while she was unconscious. “Anyway, I was trying not to let my Flash stuff mix too much in my personal life, and since Cisco was kind of really involved in the Flash stuff, I asked Barry to keep his, uh, relationship on the DL around you. Which is terrible. I’m the worst.”

Linda scrunched up her nose, clearly unhappy with it, but sighed as she took in the desperate look on Iris’s face. “As long as this means we can finally go on double dates, with only mild complaining, you’re forgiven. Mostly.”

“Deal,” Iris grinned, but her smile fell as she searched Linda’s eyes. “Really though, joking aside, I am so, so sorry. I’ve been the worst girlfriend, I should have told you about this sooner, and I made you think that I was some sort of cheater, I didn’t even think—”

“It’s okay,” Linda shook her head, still looking like she was in a trance, and put her hand over Iris’s chest, right over the lightning-bolt emblem. “But you’re going to tell me everything, starting from the beginning, of course, and I want to meet your new friends tomorrow after work or something, but I figure that’s kind of a given. And I know that’s not who you are. I just—it didn’t make sense, before. Now it does. And _this_ is the person you are. Which is just—wow. Iris, you’re a _superhero_.”

“I guess,” Iris shrugged, making a conscious effort not to look too pleased with herself, because _wow_ , it felt good to hear Linda say that. To have her look at her with such pride in her eyes. Not that she didn’t usually, not that Linda herself hadn’t started the tradition of  making sure each other’s headlining articles were all framed and hung up around their apartment—but still.

“Oh, shut up,” Linda swatted her shoulder playfully, rolling her eyes. “You know it’s cool. Seriously, you _have_ to let me write your articles for you whenever Larkin requests a story on The Flash. That’s why you’re always so reluctant to do it, right? But now I can use the excuse to gush about my girlfriend in code and let the whole city know how wonderful you are.”

“Linda, you’re in sports. And I can’t take the credit for something you did,” Iris laughed, shaking her head fondly, a warm feeling bubbling up in her chest at the pride shining in Linda’s eyes.

“So what? I can still write. And I might specialize in sports, but you know I’m good at being cheesy as hell when it comes to the whole proud girlfriend thing. I don’t care about the credit, as long as you hang it up for me here when it makes front page. Come on, I know how uncomfortable it makes you writing it yourself. And here I thought it was because you just didn’t like The Flash. I should’ve known.” Her eyes were sparkling with delight as she looked Iris up and down, letting her gaze linger on the lightning bolt emblem before snapping back up to Iris’s face. “I’m dating a superhero. God, Iris, that’s just— _wow_.”

“I’m still just me, Linda,” Iris said gently, cupping Linda’s cheek with a glove-covered hand, smiling a little when Linda leaned in to her touch.

“Well, duh, you’ve always been amazing. But now I’ve got, like, mega bragging rights. Not that I’m going to tell anyone!” she assured as Iris opened her mouth in warning. “Just that every time there’s news of the Flash saving the city I get to be like _‘that’s my girl.’_ You know, you might be the city’s pride and joy and all, but more importantly, you’re _mine_.”

“More importantly?”

“ _Most_ importantly. I fully accept that I’m selfish, but come on, considering you’ve been blowing me off for your Flash work all this time and didn’t even think to tell me, I think I deserve that,” Linda grinned, pulling back back a bit to size Iris up, eyes darkening with that familiar mischief as they caught Iris’s gaze again. “Allllll mine.”

“Yeah,” Iris allowed, suddenly feeling a little breathless, that familiar spark flickering under her skin, like running despite being very much rooted to the spot. “Yeah, okay, fair enough. But I promise I wanted to tell you, I wanted to tell you from the very start, things just got…really complicated, really fast.” She cringed at the look Linda sent her way. “Uh, no pun intended.”

“Mhm. Speaking of really fast, now you have to tell me everything. Seriously, I want to know all about your abilities, like, how fast can you go? What else can you do? How do you disguise your voice like you were doing earlier? What—”

“Woah, Lin, slow down,” Iris smirked, fully prepared to show off. It was always fun to impress Linda, even though she was admittedly pretty easily impressed (like the time she’d kissed Iris senseless in appreciation when she’d told her she knew how to bake a specific kind of cookie Linda liked). “For starters, I have super-speed.”

“No shit,” Linda huffed and hit her arm, but her eyes were dancing with excitement. “Come on, you know what I mean. I watch the news, Iris. And read it. I mean—we _are_ the news. I know the Flash can do a lot more than just run.”

“True,” Iris conceded. She bit the inside of cheek before letting out a long breath. “Well, I can run up the side of buildings, if I’m going fast enough, and on water. Oh, and I can throw lighting, that one’s my favorite. And the voice thing, that’s—I can vibrate my vocal chords, actually, I can vibrate pretty much everything.”

“You can _vibrate_?”

“Yeah, like—” she bit her lip, considering, before reaching out. She cupped Linda’s cheek in her hand again and then vibrated her fingers, fast enough to send tingles of shock through Linda’s body but not fast enough to hurt her. “Like that.”

“Wait…” Linda’s eyes widened and she took a step back, out of Iris’s touch, although she was still staring at Iris’s hand in awe and disbelief. “You mean to tell me that you are _literally_ a human vibrator and you let me spend all that money on that stupid little thing last week?”

“I—oh,” Iris blinked, slowly catching on. “To be honest I didn’t even—I totally wasn’t thinking about—”

“I’m offended,” Linda placed a hand over her heart, inching back closer to Iris, threading her fingers with Iris’s no longer vibrating ones. “You spend all that time running around saving random strangers, and you didn’t even stop to think of all the good you could do for your own _girlfriend_ with those powers.”

“Hmm,” Iris hummed, squeezing Linda’s hand in her own and tapping her chin in thought, watching as Linda’s eyes followed the movement with interest. “Well, how about you let me make it up to you?”

“Right now?”

“I didn’t mean it as only like a one-time thing, but sure, I’ve got time.”

Linda grinned as she took her hand, pulling her over to the couch. She flopped down and pulled Iris down with her, giving one final tug that had Iris nearly falling right on top of her.

“Wait,” Iris shook her head, panting as she pulled away from Linda’s eager kiss. Linda pouted at her, wriggling a little underneath her with a whine to show her displeasure at being interrupted. “Oh, don’t give me that look. I was going to suggest that we move to the bedroom. You know, more space, more comfortable. Right?”

“Too far,” Linda groaned, reaching out to pull Iris back to her, but Iris easily dodged it.

“Not a problem.”

Iris whisked them quickly into the bedroom before Linda had time to blink, leaving her staring at Iris in wonder as she pressed her back against the mattress.

“Wow,” Linda breathed, hair windswept and pupils blown wide, still looking Iris like she couldn’t even believe she was real. “Wow that’s—handy.”

“Oh, believe me, I have a lot of tricks up my sleeve.”

Iris could have easily flashed out of her suit in no time, but Linda insisted on doing it slow, that since she was dating the Flash and all she had to properly know how to remove the woman behind the mask’s clothes, and so Iris showed her all the hidden zippers and clasps, and took her time, undoing them with care.

“This thing looks hot,” she muttered, undoing a clasp and slipping off a glove from one of Iris’s hands.

“Well, yeah, the suit can get kind of stuffy,” Iris tried to shrug from her position underneath her as Linda tossed the glove aside and went to work removing the other one, intertwining the fingers of her free hand with Iris’s, “but Cisco’s working on it and honestly I’d rather be a little hot than literally have my clothes catch on fire every time I run—which has happened by the way. I mean, the suit’s not just for show and all.”

Linda rolled her eyes, pausing as she fussed with the main clasp, just above the emblem. “I meant this looks hot as in you look hot like this. In the suit. The suit looks hot on you, like really hot, and I don’t mean temperature-wise.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, so—oh my god, _you don’t wear anything under that thing_?”

Iris shrugged, grinning wickedly as she tugged off the top part of her suit, her skin tingling pleasantly as Linda trailed her hands up her sides. “There’s a built in sports bra kind of thing—I can’t wear anything else, otherwise it chafes. Like bad, trust me, the first couple runs in this were awful.”

“Oh, I’m not complaining,” Linda shook her head, bringing her hands back down to tug at the pants, which were proving much harder to take off. Iris put her hand over Linda’s and held it tight, stalling her progress and shaking her head when Linda sent her a quizzical look.

“I’m the one who’s supposed to be making it up to you, remember?” she said, pushing Linda back against the mattress again and climbing neatly on top of her. She kissed her hard, long and lingering before pulling back with a grin, her fingers vibrating as they undid the buttons on Linda’s jeans.

“Oh, fuck, yes.” Linda squirmed in anticipation, shaking underneath Iris’s touch. Her lips curled mischievously as Iris pulled down the zipper. “Come on, hurry up, _Flash_. Use those powers for the good of—well, me.”

“Did you seriously just call me Flash in bed?” Iris laughed, tugging Linda’s pants off in one swift motion and slipping a vibrating hand underneath her underwear, feeling very satisfied when she was rewarded with a moan in return.

“Maybe,” Linda managed to get out, fingers clutching at the sheets, already breathless.

“I liked it. Do it again.”

Central City could do without her for the night, Iris conceded. Her girlfriend needed her services, and hey, the Flash was all about good deeds.


End file.
